Our Defense doesn't have a heart and soul. I was crucified last week for saying Von Miller by himself wouldn't be able to change our terrible passing D. WW is important, but his impact isn't game changing either, he has been beaten multiple occasions in coverage.

Any good defense should function without 1 or 2 of their best players. Look at what the 9ers have been doing.

JerseysFinest27Joined: 07 Jan 2010Posts: 8843Location: New Jersey... Props to Joe_Is_The_Best on the sig

Posted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 11:47 am Post subject:

Aside from Von Miller (of course) the answer is Wesley Woodyard.

ihatepotholes wrote:

Our Defense doesn't have a heart and soul. I was crucified last week for saying Von Miller by himself wouldn't be able to change our terrible passing D. WW is important, but his impact isn't game changing either, he has been beaten multiple occasions in coverage.

Any good defense should function without 1 or 2 of their best players. Look at what the 9ers have been doing.

When you consider that his replacement is Paris Lenon, yes, he is a game changer._________________

Woodyard is the most important primarily because his backup is the worst. If Woodyard had a respectable backup at MLB then this would not be the case. It is why Von's absence didn't hurt the team that bad because Irving and Shaun Phillips took his role as the pass rusher/SLB.

There is a difference between most important and best. Woodyard is the most important but Miller is the best._________________
Thanks to Joe_is_the_best for the awesome sig.

Woodyard is the most important primarily because his backup is the worst. If Woodyard had a respectable backup at MLB then this would not be the case. It is why Von's absence didn't hurt the team that bad because Irving and Shaun Phillips took his role as the pass rusher/SLB.

There is a difference between most important and best. Woodyard is the most important but Miller is the best.

If he's the 'QB' of the defense then it's more than not having a backup. It also means that none of the other starters are capable of providing the leadership the defense needs for the team to make a serious playoff run. It reminds me a lot of Baltimore with Ray Lewis. The guy was old, slow, but he more than made up for it with his football IQ. Not sure Von will be able to fill this role and Nate Irving hasn't.

Woodyard is the most important primarily because his backup is the worst. If Woodyard had a respectable backup at MLB then this would not be the case. It is why Von's absence didn't hurt the team that bad because Irving and Shaun Phillips took his role as the pass rusher/SLB.

There is a difference between most important and best. Woodyard is the most important but Miller is the best.

If he's the 'QB' of the defense then it's more than not having a backup. It also means that none of the other starters are capable of providing the leadership the defense needs for the team to make a serious playoff run. It reminds me a lot of Baltimore with Ray Lewis. The guy was old, slow, but he more than made up for it with his football IQ. Not sure Von will be able to fill this role and Nate Irving hasn't.

Good points. He's the guy calling audibles for the defense, and adjusting formations. Way more valuable than just a physical presence.

IMO that's why we went to a lot of zone when he was hurt. JDR probably didn't feel he had a reliable signal caller on the field that understood the defense well enough to be anything but vanilla.

Woodyard is the most important primarily because his backup is the worst. If Woodyard had a respectable backup at MLB then this would not be the case. It is why Von's absence didn't hurt the team that bad because Irving and Shaun Phillips took his role as the pass rusher/SLB.

There is a difference between most important and best. Woodyard is the most important but Miller is the best.

If he's the 'QB' of the defense then it's more than not having a backup. It also means that none of the other starters are capable of providing the leadership the defense needs for the team to make a serious playoff run. It reminds me a lot of Baltimore with Ray Lewis. The guy was old, slow, but he more than made up for it with his football IQ. Not sure Von will be able to fill this role and Nate Irving hasn't.

Except Ray Lewis was actually a liability in his final year with the Ravens. If you saw the Superbowl, you saw a guy do absolutely nothing and fail to make plays. People like to credit him because he is Ray Lewis and nothing more. They think the Ravens won the Superbowl because he danced in pre-games and not because Flacco was playing like Joe Montana out there. Ray was hurting the team more than not.

There is nothing I hate more than when people make up a bunch of intangibles to make a guy look better than what he is. Ray Lewis at the tail end of his career is the greatest example of this. He was dominant during his prime but he was really nothing special in his final years in the league.

If the backup MLB on this team was a halfway decent player like Jerod Mayo instead of Paris Lenon. Woodyard's absence wouldn't be that important since Mayo is a very good MLB himself.

When I said Woodyard is the QB of the defense, I say that because he makes the defensive play calls. A lot of MLBs can do the same, not just Woodyard. Woodyard does not have some magical power. Woodyard just isn't some giant scrub like Paris Lenon._________________
Thanks to Joe_is_the_best for the awesome sig.

Could I be so bold and say he's more important than Champ Bailey? Going forward, if we had to make cuts...

Nothing bold about that. He's far more important, not even close.

I think our performance this past Sunday emphasized that. Post game locker room player interviews were especially telling. Multiple players talked about how good it was having their "leader" back (their words, not mine)and how he elevated the entire "D".

C'mon FO, reward this guy. We've seen how we play without him and it's not pretty.